She is My Sin
by Diebound
Summary: While trapped in the Shadow Realm, Mai, much more than just her mind, is constantly tortured by her demonic captor. [MaixDark Marik] Rated for violence, gore, torture, etc.
1. Painful Reality

Disclaimer: Do not own YGO yada-yada.

Don't like my "old" (that being a year or two ago, when I first uploaded this) style of writing so I re-uploaded this fic with what you might call my "improvement". xD

Still inspired on it by the song She is My Sin, so I didn't change the title, more liberty on naming chapters though.

Bloody, disturbing and bit totally-out-of-sense-and-hopefully-not-OOC? What'd you expect from a Marik x Mai?

I don't have a beta reader so don't complain about my stupidity!

* * *

_Faint sobs, distant cries…how can she stand so much and not die? By all I've put her through she should be as good as nothing by now.  
But she isn't… she's everything and more. So fragile, so delicate… there must be a pretty strong will for her to keep her chin up like that.  
Those whom she relies on so much…_

His thoughts raced through his head as he watched Mai stare faintly at the chains binding her to the ground. Her eyes lost in regret and sorrow, but the way she positioned her hands over the chains, she showed pride, still. About an hour had passed since he had trapped her. Sure, her mind remained in that sandy prison, but she was here, right in front of him. Bound and captured like a little pig, the little pig that she really is.

Marik approached her and picked up her bruised hands to caress them. They were still as soft as ever, a little bony, though. Her nails broken and purple… and obviously not due to nail polish.

The dirty face of the girl jumped up in fear, she quickly sat up. Marik chuckled at her common reaction tours seeing him.

"I don't expect for you to see me this way any longer…you should get used to me." He told her. The little blonde's veins filled with rage.

"You can't treat me like this! You're a sick lunatic! What do you plan to do wi-"

Marik silenced her with a touch of his finger on her lips. Mai's fear overpowered her anger once _again_.

"Talk to me dear, really. Where would you rather be than here? Or where do you think you _would _be; hadn't your knight jumped to your rescue?"

Mai glared, almost growled. She wouldn't remove her death glare from his eyes. One thing she had learned and kept close was that you don't ever show your fear. Noticeably enough, that had been her downfall. She built her pride that way, and continued climbing up the wrong mountain, alone and without a partner. That was just the way she wanted it, at a certain point anyway. Until that frustrating someone got in her way. It's in every fairy tale, right? First you hate it him, then you adore him, and lastly, you lose him.

"I'd be in-"

"Hell. Right next door." He grinned. His shark teeth made Mai's 'death glare' whimper on down to the dirty ground. Mai looked away, she'd seen that grin enough times to make her want to be sick. She _was _sick of it, in fact. Every time a little smirk like that found it's way through the corner of his mouth, she became enraged. To her, it said something, that smirk said 'Nya, nya! Look at where you are now! I win! You _loose_!" and Mai hated it. She hated to lose and she _had _lost. She had lost to _Him_. She should be everything! She should be perfect, flawless. Beautiful, sexy, picture perfect, strong and dominant, better than the bastard standing next to her, better than the one in the front. And most importantly, more than wanting to, but she _needed _to be the best. The most excellent, the greatest and the finest. Not only at dueling, but all else. That sinful desire, her lust for _everything_, she had it and she loved it. No regrets about it whatsoever. She loved to prove it and put right under the nose of whomever she felt like it. She sold herself, her perfect body, to prove she had _it_. She dueled, she practiced and she crushed them all.

One of the reasons why she loved being on top, somewhat literally, was because she could step on the looser. She could laugh at them and ridicule their inferiority from her. She did, of course, and enjoyed it to no end. That bad-ass-I'm-better-than-you feeling was one of her best qualities. With every victory, she felt she became bigger, more beautiful, and better than the world. She had no role models, she was her own admirer, heck, she'd made it clear in her mind that she'd sleep and make her self with pleasure if she could. Herself was the only one she yearned to touch, to feel and crave. He own body aroused her... Because herself was the only thing that mattered, her lover was her pride. And when she acquired what she wanted, she wanted more. It was like a bottomless pit inside her, it didn't fill up with whatever she threw in there. Mai wanted it all, money, sex, cars, diamonds, women and certainly a lot of men, _everything there was to have_. Everything there was that was meant _not _to be had.

It really had always been that way, little Mai obtained whatever she wanted, she'd been spoiled with that sickness to have it all since she was small. Even though she didn't realize it, she was frighteningly greedy at such a young age. Greed, her early sickness, was her toy, her teddy. The kid next door couldn't _possibly _have something she didn't, heavens no, that was a crime. Mummy had to buy her what the kid had, and Mummy always _did_. If she saw a pitiable little girl walking down the street with a cheap doll, she'd drop her priceless one from that Paris-collection and demand to have one like the little girl's. Jealousy was one of her weaknesses at that point. And even though her parents would mange to get her one, Mai always had it in her innocent little head that she would have rather had that _little girl's doll _and see her cry when she cuddled the dirty toy in her arms. But her deep feelings of her best friend, of envy, were kept hidden as she stared down from the high window of her room to the doll.

Mai would grin, the young soon-to-be monster knew her own power. She knew where the daughter of her rich and powerful parents stood. A snap of her delicate fingers brought servants with gold-coated platters kneeling before her tiny figure.

Yet, it didn't make her _feel _powerful, knowing that obvious fact wasn't enough for her back then. The maid would comb her incomparable gold-shinning hair curls and Mai would look on the mirror, bored, annoyed and expressionless. Then Mai would smile to herself, and herself, right on that mirror, would smile back. The young lady would command her servant like a dog, because she bloody loved it when the woman wanted to bark at her but could not.

And it might be hard to believe, but little Mai once felt love. Young love. A neat little boy would walk by everyday and drop a rolled up paper at her door. She would stare in wonder, lost in unknowing desire. Her father's library contained an uncountable number of books, and although the young girl couldn't read on more than three-lettered words, pictures said a thousand to her. The boy dropped the newspapers, perhaps he liked to read? She wanted to learn as well, but her home-teacher prohibited her, she said she was too young. Mai would be furious, that tummy-butterfly feeling for the boy faded as fast as it came, it was overwhelmed by anger. How could _she _be denied something? _Anything? _Especially knowledge. Oh, but that was the road bump that encouraged the sweet child to speed herself up, and pass that bump with ease. And she had, she learned things _all by herself_. Her home-teacher was of no use anymore, she told Mummy that the book lady _touched _her and made her feel _weird_. Now _that's _what she called 'with ease' and style, never saw the incompetent woman again. Now Mai would read and see things she shouldn't have. Never did the lucky parents know of it, they were, of course, much too busy making their little creation's life perfect. _Perfectly disgusting_.

Mai suddenly shook her head after Marik's last remark, mainly to brush off her thoughts of the past. He smiled and moved closer to her. The Monster crawlingly stirred his fingers through her palm in a pattern, leaving a burnt mark where he touched.

Mai whimpered but knew that pulling her hand away would be an unspeakable mistake. She cried loudly in pain at seeing smoke rising from her own live and burning flesh.

"N-no! Stop it! **Stop!**"

"Shh…don't wake the shadows, sweetheart. Don't you love it? That smell rising?" He said to her in a soothing yet creepy voice. He admired his work and her reaction. There comes the blood, pouring out of her palm. Mai was petrified, she wanted to look away but couldn't. Couldn't move at all. The pain, from the moment his somehow burning-finger touched her, had raced up to her head and banged her hard. The pain and the horror at seeing yourself like this, watching yourself die slowly. Dieing softly, the way she had always thought she would part as. However, not even her worst nightmares would bring up this psychotic monster to do this to her. No one's nightmares, she wouldn't wish this misery upon _anyone_.

Her hand felt like it was about to blow up. She looked at him, he was smiling. Enjoying it. Why of course he would, he sits as the devil's right hand and follows it through. If not, he is _it _himself. The pain began choking her. Suddenly, there was no air around her and her chest was being pounded on with heavy blows. Marik removed his hand from hers. Mai looked at the bloody hand in horror, breathless, terrified of the bloody, leaking _pentagram_ on it.

"Th-this is… this is the…" She couldn't speak. She didn't how or what to say about what he'd just done to her. The mark, that mark. _The _mark. That _damned _mark. The wickedly cursed symbol. It still leaked of her graceful blood, which aroused Marik immensely.

Sweet Mai. It was simply never said enough to him. She was sweet and beautiful, with a pinch of dangerousness. He would always, always admire her to no rest. She could put Venus, the most beautiful, to her knees. Marik only wondered how she had not yet gotten pregnant, he honestly had no intention in changing that but it was a crossing idea. This man, the one who's evil rage surpassed that of the Grand Demon's, have a an offspring with this imprisoned, poor, used and ragged slut? No doubt that it was a crossing idea, it crossed, passed and went off the Nowhere-highway.

"We've made a pact, my dear."

Marik stood up and looked proudly down at her, what he now _owned,_ his most adored possession. He'd just added a new monster to his farm, to his hell. Her smooth legs scratched, her dark mascara smeared all upon her eyes from constant tears. Bruised hands and arms, torn clothes, and her golden hair obscuring the shame in her _now _rightfully beautiful face.

Mai cut his pleasure short by looking up at him with her trembling hand in front of her. Biting her lips to shorten the urge to scream.

"This is- is this really what you enjoy? Suffering? _My _suffering?"

( _As a matter of fact, it is. But, come on, let's not get so greedy, it isn't just yours. )_

Marik violently grabbed her wrist and pulled her up by it, pressing hard with his nails against it. Mai shrieked in pain to this, her blood from the newly made wound he was now making on her wrist dripped on his arm.

He spoke directly to her face.

"You see, this is a game…you're playing a dangerous game with a devil…"

Mai cried and whimpered loudly. She tried to think of whatever she could say to make him let go and yet rushing and crying mind could think of nothing but pain and burning.

"_I'm sorry!_"

Her prideful eyes were long from sparkling with arrogance as they were minutes ago. She might truly be sorry, sorry for nothing. Sorry for being nothing and not enough.

_( Enough for what? To please this bastard? )_

"You lost the game Mai, you lost _again_." He said harshly, throwing her back against the wall and walking out of the cell... walking out to the real world. Mai figured that's what it was. Since she had been thrown into that prison-slash-cell, she had seen him walk out there and not see him past that. Maybe it did go to the _real _world, whatever real meant in here.

Mai crawled to a dark corner and covered her face with her bloody hand, crying.

"Why? Why me! I just wanted to be like the others!"

Lies. Repugnant lies that she wasn't believing even for her disgraced self. _Be like the others? _Since when? After she decided to be _above _all others and step on them like cockroaches?

If so, Marik would think, she had a long, long way to go to associate herself with _cockroaches_.

Mai choked in tears.

"… to fit in... to be right!"

She continued to weep, pressing hard against her marked hand to let out her anger and cause herself pain. No response as to why she had just done that. Her anger perhaps, her ridiculous and useless anger. Perhaps she wanted to win, to win and see who could cause more pain to her, him or herself. Insanely ridiculous.

She lay down on a bundle of chains and closed her wet eyes.

_I have so much fear for him_

_I can't forget him, he haunts me… Why?_

She can't forget him, she sees and hears Him at all times.

_lost/devil/shadows/pact/desire/fear  
Why are these words in my head?  
"_**My Dear?"**

The name of perfection. . .  
Crying in the darkness. . .

* * *

I never said I was good with endings! Anyhow, this was supposed to go on and not stay a one-shot, but that all depends. Kinda found it creepy enough, she wants it continued but I just don't know. 


	2. To Taste Why You're Ashamed

Thank you for the reviews!

This story doesn't have a long way to go. It's pretty much my way to get these icky thoughts out of my head, though I can't make them go as far as I wish. :D;

**Do not own Yuugioh or anything else mentioned.**

P.S: The chapter titled just popped up since I was listening to a song with the lyrics... You don't have to, but it would be so sweet if you knew which it was!

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Mai was unbearably sweating in her sleep, if it could actually be called sleeping. She slowly opened her eyes. There's that noise that's been keeping her awake again. What the hell is that?_It's just fucking creeping me out…_

It almost sounded like… muffled crying or moaning… What if Marik kept someone else here? In another chamber?

_I'll…I'll take my chances._

She stood up and supported herself around the wall, everything was much too dark to see, and touching the wall all through this way would avoid her tripping over the chains on her foot.

"I-is someone there?" Her voice quivered.

The moaning stopped, followed by a raspy sigh. Mai gulped. She heard an indistinct voice, surely someone said something this time. Perhaps Marik did keep another prisoner in this… place.

_No, she was not about to refer to this place as the spot right next door to hell like Marik had described… insane fucker. _

Or maybe Marik brought in someone recently because the blonde had certainly not heard anything before. Regardless of the chilling thoughts and feelings Mai was having about what she doing, she kept going alongside the wall.

"Please answer me, please! I know I heard someone…"

She only frightened herself even more by saying this. Could she be hearing things? Could Marik be screwing with her head, somehow or someway, and be building these absurd concerns inside her head? Alarming thoughts of Marik truly having other fatalities in here and… doing these shocking things like He's done to her. Possibly even worse.

Suddenly the voice spoke louder and clearer.

"_Help me…"_

Mai gasped. She noticed that as she kept walking along side the wall, she never hit the bars… she was fully sure that Marik restrained her in some sort of cell-like room. Would He really just leave it open? She discarded the thought, this so-called shadow realm is a real puzzle. She kept going by the wall, slower and being much more cautious. Her dirty fingers bumped against cracks and sharp points, but she continued to graze over them. Touching a bug or spider web were the least of her worries.

"I-I'll go to you, please keep talking to me!" She shrieked with a broken voice, full of fear, and starting to loose her patience. The voice only continued to moan in pain.

Mai looked back down at her chains and down to her feet. She sincerely hoped that they would reach far enough, unknowing, of course, of how long 'enough' had to be. She took a deep breath and looked ahead again.

_A light? _

All of the sudden there was a crack of light coming out of a room with its door closed right along this strange hallway. This was instantly light of hope for Mai. She kept going, quicker this time and without being guided by the wall, hurrying her pace and ignoring the pain in her bare feet. Strangely, she had just noticed this, despite the fact that they were already bruised and bleeding from the rough ground, which looked much like the walls, only dirtier.

When she finally reached the door, she hesitated for a second, afraid of and questioning what could possibly be on the other side. Mai realized that she wasn't in any position where she could be trying to help someone when she obviously needed the help first. However, she gave it a quick second thought and decided to go through with it, if she could help, after all, why not try. It could always end up in her benefit, she might ask the poor inmate things she could know about Marik or what He'd been doing.

She finally slid the door open and squinted, bringing her hands to her eyes and covering her face; unused to the bright light.

But her eyes widened as quickly as they had closed before. Mai retreated in horror and tripped on her chains, as if she knew they wouldn't have allowed her any further anyway. Still on the ground, she tried to back up to the wall even more, trying to get away from what she was looking at.

Her sight being the young boy Malik. He was strapped to some sort of operating table with a black, muggy, plastic-looking substance. Intense punctures around his naked body, a small blade jammed in his stomach between his ribs. There were parts of his skin peeled off all along his scrawny arms, and alongside some peculiar hieroglyphs appearing to have been burned on with great detail. Some of his wounds were painfully stapled up, almost like a joke, but evidently open and bleeding. Rows of pins and needles sticking out all along his neck.

He, in an excruciatingly painful way, turned his head around to face Mai. The prickles down his neck twisted with his skin and dug themselves deeper. Malik only moaned with a mouthful of redness, gurgling out a gush of chunky blood. The blonde whimpered and trembled silently as she backed away against the wall even more, tears streaming down her cheeks. Her entire body began to tremble, her chains tangled and rattling at her feet.

Malik's eyelids were stitched and sowed down to his skin to prevent him from opening his eyes.

"_Please… help me--!"_

Mai cried out and screamed piercingly as she shook her head, almost trying to block out the image before her. Hurriedly, she sat up and began unscrambling her legs from the chains, hands shaking frantically.

"_Puhh… please… h-hel… help--"_

She began to whimper, noticing that she wasn't helping her situation any better with her panic.

She screamed.

"No! Shut up! Shut up! _**Shut up**_"

The woman cried, pulling at the bulge of shackles on her. She finally let go of them and quickly stumbled up. Half falling and running back as she made her way back to the cell, not caring if she crashed into or tripped on something in the dark, she slammed into Marik.

In all her hell screaming, yelling, and crying she didn't notice that she was currently in the arms of His. Marik pressed his arms tighter around her and closer to Himself in a not quite soothing manner. He ran his hands through her back, entwining his fingers between strands if her corset.

She calmed down, not exactly controlling her severe shaking. "I-it is real? Is this real?! Are these fucking things you do… the things you show me…" She panted lightly.

"_Why_?" She whispered, sobbing. Mai slowly fell to her knees with Marik still holding her.

"They're very real, my darling. We are real. Doesn't it cause you the least pleasure to observe this, Mai? _Doesn't it_?" He whispered the last words in her ear, as He slowly slithered his hands above her legs and abdomen.

"You're… you are disgusting."

She closed her eyes and lowered herself to cry on his chest.

Mai was a fighter, Mai was strong. But however strong or aggressive she was, she was still a woman. And although she had always been insanely proud of that, she still had something that could bring even the most confident female down. Emotions, feelings, compassion. Now, none of those words are very descriptive of Ms. Kujaku… but she cannot get rid of them, and those feelings were what tore her up right then and there. This situation she was in, this wasn't a competition, this wasn't a contest to prove how magnificent she was. Which she was, of course, God forgive a poor soul ever said otherwise. Nothing could have ever changed her mind about that. Yet now, she wasn't so sure. She hated herself for the fact that only because of the state she was caught in, because it wasn't dueling, that she a pathetic piece of nothing. She had never given up on _anything_ she was determined to get before. Suddenly this monster comes along and begins carving his way to her flaws, things she had always kept locked inside her and made sure they were _never _exposed. Yet here was the stain in her stream and flow of greatness.

_Marik._

The fucking bastard who made Himself almost the worst thing in her secretly screwed up life. That's not his problem, obviously, He didn't have a care in the world for her troubles, giving that He was causing more and more of them for her.

Her pathetic reality had been exposed during the duel with Him. She had tried so hard, _so hard,_ not to give up and she almost did. If it hadn't been for… for her… _friend? _Someone-- somebody she couldn't quite remember but was sure that was there. This person helped her. She carried herself out 'till the end, going down with her pride.

Mai couldn't believe her thoughts. A blurred image in her head, a ghostly figure trying to help off her knees with encouraging words… and yet she couldn't quite recall.

Marik lightly shook Mai's limp body laying on Him. He cupped her face in his hands and placed her face to face with him.

"Would you just look at yourself now, my doll…" He slowly licked her tear soaked cheek. She shivered at sick feeling of his wet, hot tongue in contact with her soft skin.

"So fragile…" He whispered hungrily.

Mai violently pushed him away and looked at him coldly.

"You do not _own_ me! Can't you see how much you've hurt me? You speak of caring, but all I fucking hear and see is pain! I don't understand you!"

"You'll learn."

He held her previously marked hand and kissed the symbol, a forming scar and still bloody. Mai shivered and closed her eyes, holding back tears.

Malik's painful moaning continued, even louder, in the background.

Marik drew his mouth to her neck, slowly moving himself up to her chin and sniffing at it. Mai whimpered with bated breath, not daring to open her eyes.

She was feeling so violated, and although one might say she should be used to the feeling, this was completely different. Mai didn't consider herself a… seller. She didn't have a half-assed excuse of doing what she used to do for a _living_, for economic survival. She used to do it, to explicitly expose herself for simple pleasure. She wasn't about to defend herself for her past actions, she didn't have enough care for that. She respected herself, however, Mai wasn't sex-crazed animal looking around all night for a man or woman to use to please herself. Because that's how she viewed it, even though they were paying her, it wasn't a service she was giving. She only did it to please _herself_, she just happened to be smart and decide to make money off of it. The thought of walking into a club or a bar, taking a seat, and then waiting for her prey to come to her didn't bother her the slightest bit.

It was a very sad and cruel world for her, she had known that since she was a toddler. She had known that since her parents were stripped away from her when she was at the age when she needed them both.

But Mai hated to think of them. She just felt like she didn't know who the hell she was thinking _of_, like she hardly ever knew them. So, when she would go on and do her whoring acts, the thought of 'what would your _mother _think of you?' was the farthest thing from her mind.

"You sick b--" Mai groaned.

Marik licked her lips and put his arms around her, pulling her closer to him, but Mai resisted the kiss.

The man noticed the sickened rejection. He rested his head on her shoulder for a second, and Mai suddenly began feeling lightheaded. Like a train-wreck slamming into her cranium, except she was falling peacefully asleep and loosing consciousness.

Marik opened his eyes and turned back to her, glaring at her motionless body. Her eyes had remained wide open, blank and emotionless, pupils completely gone. He moved her pale hair off her face and picked her up, looking much like a ragged up bridal picture. He walked down the dark corridor, past the tortured Malik and not even wincing at the sound of his sickened moaning. He ended up turning and walking into a dark room similar to Malik's.

Much too similar.

He carefully placed her in the center table. Her body twitched at contact with the cold stainless steel.

The image of Malik's state being inflicted upon Mai crossed His mind...

He stood silent for a while, admiring the woman's perfect curves and features, her every ideal detail. He decided against torturing her in that manner, if He did so, His reason for keeping her alive would be worthless.

He continued look at her and just noticed that she was sweating and breathing heavily. Marik slowly wiped the smeared lipstick from the side of her lip with His thumb. So miserably and _desirably _pathetic that she was. The psychopath couldn't even help but to lick his lips as He looked at her, He urged to rip off her corset and touch her. Strangely enough, He did not.

He only stripped her of her dirty clothes, moved her long, thin arms and placed them by her sides and then proceeded to cover her with a black, thin sheet. He tied her wrists, feet, and neck to the table with wires and chains that were hanging from it. He smirked to himself.

"So fucking beautiful," He whispered while pulling back wet, sweaty locks of hair from her face. He ran a finger down her smooth jawline, a strange look of admiration in His cold eyes. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes as He gently leaned in and-  
_Ahh… no…  
_He opened his eyes, inches away from her face, starring into hers.  
_Not yet.  
_He turned back and began to walk away, the lights switched off as He stepped out and left her.

Left her with nightmares of tomorrow.


	3. The Unrequited Dream

Short chapter! But trust me, it was twice as short before the crappy re-edit. XD  
Next one will be longer.

_

* * *

__to discovery  
__is not ignorance-  
__it is the illusion of knowledge. _

* * *

Mai's dreadful experience was unforgettable as much as the next. The girl was moaning, sweating and whimpering in her sleep again... She constantly had unexplainable nightmares.

* * *

_Running, getting away from the flames of hell. People are screaming at me. Or to me? But I can't understand, they're saying these things and whispering others. Some of them sound a bit clear, but they are drowned out by the screaming and frantic words of the others. _

_I tried to be what I'm supposed to be, the thing's He's turned me into. But I failed. And I made a horrible mistake as well, I tried to make him see my pain by implying it to him... futile. My flesh, my soul, my love is burning...  
_

**I can't breath!**

_( Who? )_

_You._

**The fire, take it off of me! Help me, anyone! **_**God**_**, Please!**

_( Who am I? )  
My lover._

_Then, I myself become one of those voices screaming, I join in their pain._

_  
( Who are you? )  
A tool, your possession.  
_

The time.

The time of death was midnight. Mine was in bright light, holding my own flesh and blood; whishing a hushed death upon it.

It was a mistake, a sin. My individual condemnation.

_( Do you love him? )  
Yes._

My infant one, forgive me as I squeeze your delicate neck, and see your gloriously damned life shatter._  
_

_( Do you love _him_? )  
No..._

Disaster, _failure_.

I'll see you through when you walk away from me, and watch you die. Your words of accusing truth stabbed me through, my enjoyment will be ending you.

_  
( Why won't you feel the same for me, too… )_

Bringing you to this hell was not my punishment, nor was it when I ended your life. My sin was to have slept... The day I slept and made love to a monster... No, not 'love'; revenge.

Mai screamed in her sleep, but did not awake. A haunting eerie echoed the room.

_My love, my love! Forgive me!_

_I am damned, and you forever carry the same fate!_

_O' my child, why won't you die?!_

She screamed again, louder this time, as a plead for herself to wake up.

_These blood-splattered hands don't shake, they don't tremble.  
They have caused pain, yet they_

_Laugh when they drip of this redness._

* * *

"NOU--" Mai awoke yelling these meaningless words but did not dare finish what she was to say. Her pupils dilated in from nothingness as she realized her immobile state and panicked.

"I-I can't move, why's he done this to me now?"

She tried to move her locked hands to no prevail. She began coughing, gasping for air from the tight, wiry string around her neck that she was tightening by moving so much. Her neck began to bleed, her hair roughly bleaching with red.

"B-bastard,"

She cried.

"Come back... "

She painfully turned her neck to look around the dark room, it was some kind of psychotic version of an operating span. There was some of everything, even rusty axes and saws, all types of deathly poisons and such atop the surrounding tables and counters. The walls were stained with blood marks, a symbol on the door caught Mai's eye. The same mark on her hand.

She looked at a desk not too far from her, the Millennium Rod was sitting in it with it's eye shinning colorfully.

Wait, didn't she remember this? Hadn't she seen that before… she couldn't recall, but the object, it's light, seemed familiar.

Mai narrowed her eyes angrily at it's sight, and she knew there was no question about having to get it. Her blood boiled in anger just by looking at the dagger, a painful reminder of her dreaded possessor...

She screamed in anger and frustration from her immobile condition again. Then the woman suddenly gasped, she was sensing a wet substance on her leg. She stretched her neck down as far as she could to look at her entire leg covered in blood. It was her palm, her marked hand. Somehow, the wound had just become fresh and bloody again. The red liquid already begun dripping off the table.

She twisted her hand in a manner where she could barely hold on to the rusty chain that was holding her hand and squeezed it. She whimpered and bit her lip, then tightened her grip on the chain.

_Ugh… if there's something I've learned from this place so far is that inflicting more pain sometimes makes it go away._

The chain suddenly broke in a quick snap. Mai looked at her very own hand as if it was some sort of godly precious object and then back to the chains on the floor.

_( It was the tree of knowledge, and with a single bite of the bloody red fruit, she would know things she was not meant to. )_

"My god…" She whispered. She took a deep breath and swallowed.

_Might as well do it quit before regretting it._

Mai stretched her hand to her other side and did the same as with the first, burning off the chain in a second.

She then closed her eyes, gulped, and then drew her free hands to her neck, held the wire as hard her damaged hand allowed her to and pulled on it.

"Ahhh--!"

Her feet trembled as she choked. Her vision was blurring, her pupils expanded to wide, black stains as she began to gag. By this time, the girl didn't even notice when the hospital-white lights of the room flickered on.

It was hard to admit it, but there was something strange that she was getting from doing this. She was freeing herself, but it was hurting so much. Then, it wasn't really hurting, because freedom is what Mai wanted.

She moaned and coughed... again and again, louder and louder each time. Malik's moaning from the other room were now very much out sounded by Mai's painful and shuddering screaming. Her eyes slowly turned a deathly crimson as her entire face reddened. Tiny veins snaking their way along her forehead threatened to burst. If, at the moment, Mai could've screamed and panted, she would've; except the lack of air in her lungs wouldn't have it. "Ah--Ahh!"

_( It was wrong when Eve took the apple, )_

The wire finally snapped, and her neck was by now devastated; cut, burned and bruised. She gasped and coughed for breath. Without giving herself time to recuperate from the pain she had just caused herself, she proceeded to free her feet.

_( But the temptation pushed her on, the serpent was deceiving. It knew the truth and offered this to her. )_

She curled her legs to her body and covered her face with her hands. The blood from the marked hand helped smear her make up more than it was from her tears already.

After all she had just done, something finally kicked in and she noticed her nude condition and wondered what she could put on.

_( It was wrong when Eve saw that she was naked, )_

Mai frantically got off the table and walked around the room, being non-too careful about touching a thing. Her jacket and her tiny skirt were on the floor, thrown by the door. She picked up the white corset and stared at it.

_( And after that, after just one sin committed, with the serpent's work done, the future could only hold nightmares and chaos. )_

Mai picked up a silver platter sitting on the table next to her. Her reflection was clear on it, yet dusty and scratched. That made no difference to what she saw anyway, wherever she looked, her reflection seemed to always be scratched.

The blonde hurriedly wiped her bloody face and collar with her jacket and then simply dropped it back in its place. The wound in her neck didn't seem as deep as she felt it should be, as painful as she felt it. Though she greatly itched to, she resisted the urge to gulp as that would only send a ball of pain down her throat.

She then struggled to tighten the strings of her corset behind her, but barely managed to then tie a knot.

As soon as she put it on, she heard a very loud thump far away followed by a groan. Mai was shocked, but strangely not in fear. She looked at her bare and bruised feet and then the dirty, glass-shattered and bloodied floor.

_I don't need it… it's like taking his pity, and I do _not _need it…_

She turned to look at the Rod, still shinning, and then fiercely cleaned her tears to then run out tripping and almost falling, making it look so desperate by running out into the darkness. Crying and doing nothing but screaming a boy's name, her tears almost cried out more joy.

"You're here! You've come for me!! Oh my longed love for you! _Jounouchi_!!"


End file.
